Algirdas Klimaitis

Algirdas Klimaitis (?-?) (often referred as Jonas Klimaitis in non-Lithuanian literature) was a Lithuanian journalist and para-military commander.

Biography

for some time he was trading in livestock, but went bankrupt, later he began wrting to newspapers. Klimaitis is also known to be Nazi agent since 1936. During the outbreak of the Operation Barbarossa, he formed a military unit of roughly 600 members and engaged in the battles with Soviet army for the control of Kaunas. On the evening of June 23, most of the city was in the hands of insurgents [http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0253333598&id=USW9-xQ85FwC&pg=PA97&lpg=PA97&dq=klimaitis&sig=oa1kVS3fIRHYbqneBGSsK-NICzk Zvi Gitelman (ed.) "Bitter Legacy: Confronting the Holocaust in the USSR", ISBN 0253333598. Indiana University Press, 1998, p. 97.] ] . Klimaitis' unit was not subordinate to the Lithuanian Activist Front or the Provisional Government of Lithuania [http://www.genocid.lt/Leidyba/13/bubnys.htm lt icon Arūnas Bubnys. "Lithuanian Security Police and the Holocaust (1941–1944)"] ] . On the night from 25-26 June, instigated by Nazi Security Police (Sipo) and SD (Sicherheitsdienst or Security Service, the intelligence arm of the Nazi Party), and personally by SS Brigadeführer Franz Walter Stahlecker the unit started pogroms of Jews. [cite web |url=http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/Einsatz_Baltic.html |title= |accessdate=2008-08-06 |last= |first= |coauthors= |date= |work=Extracts from a Report by Einsatzgruppe a in the Baltic Countries |publisher=jewishvirtuallibrary.org] By 28 June, 1941, according to SS Brigadeführer Franz Walter Stahlecker, 3800 people were killed in Kaunas and further 1200 in other towns of the region . Numbers of victims in Stahlecker's report are probably exaggerated but pogroms indeed have happened .

Algirdas Klimaitis was eventually discovered living in Hamburg, Germany in the 1980s. Klimaitis died at the old age in Germany. It is estimated, that he was untouched because his son Algis Klimaitis is esitmated to be conscripted by KGB.

References